This WordPress.com site is the bee's knees

Festivity and Futility: a mix of opposites? They collide in the Autumn on the Holiday of Sukkot! It is the season of harvest, of rejoicing, in the Jewish world and beyond. Sukkot, the festival of the harvest, follows the somber Yom Kippur by four days, with a week long celebration. Coincidentally, in the Muslim world this year is the four day feast Eid al Adha, commemorating Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice his son. And the Indian Ganesh festival is now as well!
The command for Jews on Sukkot is to be joyful, out in our fragile huts. A paradox, to experience both fragility and joy. And that’s as it should be, because it’s harvest time, when the earth miraculously provides us with bounty as a mother nurses her child, as the land prepares to sleep and plants die. And as it should be, because our lives are fragile, yet we rejoice.
The Torah text for the Shabbat immediately preceding the festival is Ha-azinu: the ancient parting song of Moses to the Israelites. Moses will die soon as we enter the land of Promise. This powerful poem in part portrays a Motherly God, brooding over her nestlings, laboring to birth a nation, and nursing us with Honey from the Rock. (Deut. 32:13) “Rock” is the oft repeated metaphor for God in this text, and also, interestingly, in L’chu n’ran’nah which also commands: Rejoice! How pointedly on target: at a time of feasting and joy, of course God is maternal! (Dahling, eat! I hear my grandma say through misty memory)

So where is the paradox in the Text, you ask? In Deut. 32, verse 9 , it is explained that we, the People, are God’s portion (inheritance), Jacob’s portion is hevel, meaning breath or mist! Hevel: it same word as Abel’s name, who is killed by Cayin, his brother. It is the same as Kohelet’s philosophy (Ecclesiastes), which whispers that our pursuits are Hevel , insubstantial as breath. Kohelet advises us to eat, drink and be merry in spite of Insubstantiality. Because wisdom and the memories of joy can perhaps cross time and generations: In Verse 7 the Text reads: Remember the days olam: eternal, it is the wisdom of the generations. In this text God is sustaining us through Tohu the wild chaos of the desert. And in just a week, we’ll begin Genesis, which Creativity organizes the Tohu into the substance of the universe. For me, being in the Sukkah at this time is a grounding experience, and at the same time a mistical one: on sunny days it’s joyous, and other days it’s misty and sad. And tonight, on the first night, if the clouds clear, will be the full, large, moon at perigee (closest approach). Sukkot is always on the full moon. But at the height of her glowing, the earth’s shadow will drape across and dim her: it’s a full lunar eclipse! What a paradox is this time of year and this Holiday: light and shadow, joy and futility, what a mess! It must be Autumn and Sukkot! Wishing readers Moadim l’simcha, seasons of joy, and chag sameach! Happy Holy day.

My son, Jay, when he was five, in our Sukkah,

Thanks to study partners Jim and Joel for the discussion pathway which opened, and Jim for encouragement.

It’s a New Moon tonight, and with theextra dark sky Perseid meteor showers should be brilliant! For fun, I did a search of “New Moon stories” on Google. It seems there is a Twilight (teen Vampire) movie called New Moon: From the synopsis “A thick, yellow moon slowly transforms into the title “New Moon.” We hear a quote…. from “Romeo and Juliet”: “These violent delights have violent ends..” and, although we don’t know it yet, Bella is having a nightmare.” The cycles of the moon, though regular and reliable spark the imagination of the mysterious – vampires, werewolves, nightmares! It will be really dark tonight, but tomorrow we’ll see the crescent, and next week the first quarter. Our word for “moon” forms “month”, but in Hebrew it is chodesh, from the word chadash, new: because the moon’s always renewing! We, as the moon, are always renewing too, as we head into the Days of Awe.

This weekend we celebrate not just any month, but the month of Elul. Spelled alef, lamed, vav, lamed, Elul is an acronym for “ani l’dodi v’dodi li” from Song of Songs, the Bible’s (erotic) love poetry, and perhaps, most important Book. Song of Songs ideally expresses love between Israel (& other God-wrestlers) and God. During this month we dedicate ourself to turning toward and opening to Love & or God .

I’m learning a great new song in which love (Elul) and Erev Shabbat collide: it is Spike Kraus’ Ki Eshmera Shabbat -and it completely captures me because of its unabashed, beautiful “love-tangle”. An excerpt here:

Another week, another story to be told, another night, one more dream bound to unfold; I’ve been working overtime, to find where You’ve been hiding.

Another chance, another dazzling day of rest(!), just one glance, to know I’ve never felt so blessed. Now that You are by my side, my spirit’s set to flying! Ki eshmera Shabbat, El yishmereni, ot hi l’olme ad, beyno uveini (Because I will keep Shabbat, God guards me, Shabbat: a sign forever between God and me)

So I’ll keep this day, and every time I’ll think of You and be swept away, with every song I sing for You. And I’ll never be far behind, every time I hear You calling, Ki eshmera Shabbat….

We’ll go on in this circle, until whenever, how ’bout forever. It’s a symbol eternal, that I can always find You!

In addition to the love theme, what makes this Shabbat, Rosh Chodesh Elul, particularly special, is that it begin the month of preparation leading to Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the High Holy Days, or Daze of Ahh as explained by Dr. Deborah Lipstadt. Elul begins the forty day journey culminating in Yom Kippur. But if we wish to feel them in wonderment and “ahh!” we must take this opportunity to begin the path. She explains:

Most of us never achieve this stage. We are like people who have been told that the last scene of Hamlet is the most riveting and only show up for that scene. We fail to understand what the fuss is about. We parachute into Yamim Noraim (days of Awe). This period is the April 15th of the Jewish year, yet I spend more time preparing my taxes than preparing my soul!

Forty days journey sounds so familiar! Rebbe Nachman of Bratzlav teaches that this period is linked to Moses forty day visit on Mount Sinai to receive the tablets of the commandments. He finds connection in Moses neither eating nor drinking, in our observance on Yom Kippur, but more importantly, Moses broke those tablets in anger, and they could not be fixed.
A priceless gift destroyed in rage. We do that sometimes! But there are second chances, to begin again and build anew. Unlike the rookie attempt, Moses’ second set of tablets were hewn only with his own personal effort at carving. The renewed tablets, or Covenant, came with a bonus of a Moses absolutely radiating light: it’s not just the thing we’re after, but we who are that is changed with t’shuvah (return) and second chances. Moses showed us the path during those forty days can lead to amazing renewal, if we do the prep work. Some Reb. Nachman’s advice is used by an organization. called Beit T’shuvah. Part of their pathway of return from addiction is his practice of reflection:

Rabbi Nachman of Breslov teaches going inside one’s self as a way to recognize the power of God, and one’s own connection. Beit T’shuvah Best Practice includes reflective writing assignments, and guided attentional practices e.g. to observe and meditate on sunrise, sunset, the breath.

Reb Nachman, nick-named the Baal Shem tov, “first great master” of 18th century chasidism, and he famously suffered from depression. Without modern drugs to treat it, he struggled mightily. Somehow he found his way, at times, to joy. “The purpose of our very existence is to serve God in joy”, Reb Nachman taught. And so Hasidism arose as a rebellion against the intellectual, for a pathway toward joy. Art Green, a renown author, teacher, preeminent thinker of our day (head of Rabbinical School of Hebrew College, Boston) has published a beautiful little distillation called “Judaism’s 10 best Ideas“. The very first of these ideas which defined Judaism for him is Joy. In this week’s parashah, Re-eh or “envision!” (watch (!) for this theme further down) God sets blessing and curse for us to see and choose, and the challenge is to choose life and blessing and joy. In the next chapter, we are actually commanded, a to rejoice, D’varim 12:7

and there you will eat before the LORD your God, and rejoice in all that you put your hand to, you and your households, where YHVH your God has blessed you.

Now when we’re in Jerusalem, we’re told, spend all our money, because that spending supports the Levites, who have no possessions. We must see (re-eh) them and help them, or it’s no celebration. This command to celebrate actually repeats a few verses later in 12:12. Joyful sharing of food is among our tradition’s most powerful attributes. Art Green writes that any mitzvah done with joy carries, elevates the one who does it.

The world is like a wedding feast the Talmud teaches. Like good guests at the wedding, we are there to rejoice over everything at once. We love the music, the dancing… (what else? )

And the wedding between God, and us needs songs of love. Each day in the month of Elul, to this end, we sing psalm 27, by David. We sang this part, Achat Sha-alti

One thing I ask of You, Adonai,

only this do I seek

That I may dwell, dwell in Your house

All the days of my life

And gaze on the beauty,of You, Adonai

and visit Your holy abode

What is weird about these lyrics? The psalmist asks only one thing: but it’s huge – to dwell with God every day! But how and where do you do this and still remain alive? Another weird thing, in the first lyric, the psalmist wishes to dwell, but in the next to visit? What is going on here? Rabbi Simcha Raz offers that there’s no contradiction between dwelling a visiting. The psalmist knows that to live every day would give even God’s house the invisibility of habit! Re-eh – see, be aware! says our Torah portion! So he wishes for the fresh eye of the visitor even while dwelling.

But why aren’t we asking for forgiveness, or mercy in the psalm we read this month? Rachel Kahn Troster offers that rather than asking God’s protection from the terrors of his life, the psalmist knows that being in God’s presence is all the protection he needs. The psalmist has been abandoned by those closest to him and he does not want God to leave him. We have the right to “demand” that God be present in our lives, Troster says, “it’s our right as G-d’s creation”. In other words, we want God’s attention “re-eh” we demand – notice me! But maybe there’s more. What does it mean to want to dwell in the house of God? Perhaps for our souls to fill up on hope that this indwelling is possible! But how? The only way must be to make this earth God’s abode: beautiful and kind and just, that’s the way we can dwell in God’s house!

A poem mashup I did this week:
Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul. And it sings the tune without words, and it never stops at all… ~Emily Dickenson A bird doesn’t sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song. ~Maya Angelou

A storyAdapted from R’ Dov Peretz Elkins Jewish Stories from Heaven and Earth:

Life in Spain in 1492 was made impossible for Jews. The Inquisition under the hated Torquemada raged as a Jews were rounded up to burn. Many remained Jews in secret, lighting Shabbat candles in damp, dark cellars. There were spies everywhere. Elul was upon them, and secret Jews yearned to hear to traditional call of the shofar to fulfill the Mitzvah and celebrate Rosh Hashanah. They were so sad, they knew this was impossible. But then, a rumor began to circulate on the streets of Barcelona “Come to the Concert Hall on Rosh Hashana, and Shh, keep it quiet” There would be a special concert to honor Church and govt. officials. The Concert Hall, on Rosh Hashanah? When we yearned for the synagogue? Oh well, at least it’ll show Torquemada we have no ties left to Judaism. In a soft whisper came the reply “just go, you won’t be disappointed”. The day arrived, and the hall was filled to capacity. Spanish royalty there were pleased. The full house, they thought, was due to the famous composer Don Fernando Aguilar. What the royalty did not know was that Aguilar himself was a Morano, a secret Jew!.\ He’d announced that on this special night a concert presentation would feature instrumental music of various world cultures, highlighing unusual instruments. At the very crescendo of one very moving piece came the shofar sounds, in full keeping with tradition: sh’varim, truah! tekiya g’dolah! None of the royalty guessed at the significance of the sounds, or how deeply meaningful those sounds were to their secret Jewish companions. All the Terrible Inquisitors were present, all heard but none understood. Why did the Jews risk their very lives to listen to the call of the shofar?

Perhaps the shofar calls across time. Perhaps it is the call of hope that lives in us always. Perhaps it helps us to “live in the house of the Eternal” We don’t have answers, but we have our song, and always hope, even in darkest times.

The very next Rosh Chodesh will be Rosh Hashanah. But tonight is the new moon in the month of love collides with Shabbat & shooting stars: Wow!

G-d does not want to be believed in,to be debated and defended by us, but simply to be realized through us. ~Martin Buber

How’s your summer been? I’ve had an amazing summer filled with lots of learning and new songs, not to mention the fabulous weather here in New Jersey. I attended Ruach Ha-aretz and studied philosophy with Rabbi Laura Duhan Kaplan. Reb Laura is among the most skilled teachers I’ve met, and studying with her was absolute joy. We studied God concepts of medieval philosophies of various faiths, notably Ibn Gabirol, Aristotle & Plato, Saint Anthony, Maimonides among others. It turns out that every of these philosophers despised anthropomorphic representations of G-d! God is just something really different from this. Following the Middle Ages, Reb Laura taught, some faiths got busy honing down a creed of what their folks should believe about God. This didn’t happen in Judaism, possibly due to lack of center after Jerusalem destroyed. So is it better to leave the question of G!d’s nature unspoken and unexplored? I find this to often be the case in synagogues. This is not a good thing. The assumption is that when I say G!d, I mean the big guy with the white beard (and white skin) in the sky. The pediatric, incredibly anthropomorphic, white, male-centered myth that some folks believe in, (or so I’m told). Reb Zalman z”l in Jewish with Feeling said “that G-d that you don’t believe in, I don’t believe in either!” It’s so important to try, to struggle with the concept of God to to even begin any sort of spiritual conversation. At the end of the week in philosophy class, each student wrote down a personal concept of God, three of which were chosen (by one of us) to act out a God panel. We grilled one “God” who was “beyond understanding” and that actor replied in ways we could not understand! It was so much fun, so cathartic. I asked Reb. Laura “can we do this in real life?” and she replied, “don’t we?”
.
So I am taking the time to express my understanding of the inexpressible, undefinable, which is God. Now, I realize my concept may differ from yours, which is OK. But to shy from the attempt and the struggle is not OK, and to strive is perhaps quite ennobling: after all, it was the obsession of all those philosophers.
God is the Relational, Creative Power of the Universe.
I know this because:
in science, it is simple fact that when components of any system (creature, atom, etc) come into proper relationship, new levels of existence appear. One Biology text I use terms this “emergent properties”, which makes it appear not to be the total and complete magic that it is. There simply is a “thing” in the universe, which is creative, but only operates when things are interacting with one another properly.
So that hamster which died a moment ago has all the same organs, tissues, cells, DNA, proteins, etc as it did before, but they are no longer interacting as they were. And so the feature “life” is no longer present. Wow. Life is what happens in the space between. And all existence. Yes, the entropy inexorably pulls on it, until the hamster dies, but its life was an incredibly unlikely, outrageous event in the first place. As is consciousness, and family and community and love.
And what is Torah if not an expounding of what is proper relationship? Sometimes it’s a lesson in what not to do, a cautionary tale. But “all its paths are peace”, as my teacher, Eleanor Epstein reminded me: you’re just interpreting incorrectly if the path leads elsewhere. So what is this relationship that Torah instructs us in? Always it is love. Between humans, between humans and creation, between humans and this creative thread that runs through the universe we call God.
You cannot see love, or relationship, or interaction between parts. But you can experience these things, and know that existence depends upon it, and, as the second half of Adon Olam tells us, resonate with God and be strengthened by the connection. The whole universe is within us: in our materials, in our energy, and in the potential to be loving and creative as God is. Without this the universe is unrelieved entropy, which is the thing that makes time move only forward, and forests burn, and the glass shatter into a thousand pieces, and hearts as well.
So, for me, God has been the Relational, Creative Power of the Universe.
I could abbreviate it RCPU. But I’ll just call it God. (or Love?)

Have you heard the news? I woke up this morning! Oh, you too? I imagine you’re calling me daft or a Polyanna right about now. Can you even imagine David Letterman’s retort: “so congrats, you have awakened to a world and a life full of troubles”. I saw a news clip about Letterman Monday night: apparently it’s nine years since he survived a quintuple bi-pass. To mark the anniversary, he brought his wife and absolutely beautiful 5 year old son to the studio. “I think my life was spared so I could be a part of this little guy’s life,” he said of his son. Wow, from the king of sarcasm himself. It’s true that when we survive something like that we are more intensely aware and grateful for life’s small gifts. That’s the essence of the Modeh ani prayer, the one we say upon waking. Yes, life’s sweeter from attitude of gratitude as you open your eyes and reach for that cup of tea, and your child’s hand. Our tradition understands the fragility of life, each day an unlikely gift. But this prayer has a surprise ending: that our life’s been spared, gifted to us today because God believes in me and you and in the tasks we’ve awakened to do. To be a part of a child’s life, to smile and to help and to love. God believes in us with a great faith – Raba emunatecha – the proof is that, as unlikely as it seems, you’ve awakened. What if you awoke each morning to this mantra of gratitude, how it could transform!
Adapted from Todd Herzog’s Tov L’hodot
Alarm clock in the morning gets me out of bed
As I wake to face another hectic day
no time for hesitation, too much work ahead
but in the midst of all the chaos & the strife
I must learn to count the blessings in my life
Modah ani, I won’t take these gifts for granted
Modah ani, now I see the world anew
Modah ani, friends and family bring laughter to my soul
and my life would have no meaning without You

Sunset on the mountain, a simple melody
The freedom that I have to make my way
A newfound inspiration, a different way to see
now Your kindness warms me in the morning light
and I am shielded from the darkness of the night
Chorus
The world around me opens up and lets me in
like a mystery I finally understand
So I raise up my voice and sing out to the skies
when I realize how fortunate I am!

What are the very first memories in your life? One of my earliest memories is getting lost as a toddler. I had crossed the street, apparently, and that side was completely unfamiliar, I was terrified, disoriented. But then, out of nowhere, my Dad rescued me, he was wearing a colored polo shirt. I remember how relieved I felt. He’s gone now, but that memory connects me to my younger self, and to him.

What do I remember? Who am I? Perhaps these are two questions are really one in the same. It’s not my physical being that’s constant in the “me” throughout the years. All my atoms and molecules are daily exchanged with those of my surroundings. My skin’s surface renews every six weeks, my blood cells every hundred days or so, skeleton every three years. I’m not my job, or my home town,… though I might describe myself that way, they might change tomorrow. So what am I? More than anything it is my memories that tie me to all my yesterdays going all the way back to my childhood, to all the people I’ve know, the values I cherish, the dreams I’ve had. David Wilcox nails this link of identity and memory in The Farthest Shore

There is a rare group of individuals with super-memory ability. They can remember most of the hours of each day of their life, as I found out from Sixty Minutes last week Some enjoyed this super memory as a blessing, but some found it a burden: reliving the emotion of difficult memory, of being different from everyone else. Most of us are very choosy in the moments we remember.Check out National Geographic’s Brain Games on Memory for some fun activities and insights. But how does our brain decide which moments, which sensory inputs to archive in memory? It turns out that our memory decider, the hippocampus, is part of the Limbic system, our emotional brain. In other words, emotional content of an experience decides whether the event becomes archived. Which makes a lot of sense from a survival perspective, so we can avoid the terrifying bear in that cave down the road! What does it mean to learn or remember? Memory means strengthening connections between neurons until the pathway’s automatic and guaranteed, given the correct prompt or access.
Access: I always say I can’t remember my dreams, but if I write it down and peek when I wake up, I’ll say “oh yeah” and it comes flooding back. So both access and emotional import are needed for memory
An adorable, lovely song which illustrates how emotion and memory are linked : Why Can’t I forget

Among the most troubling aspects of emotion and memory is PTSD. An intensely emotional event is seared into memory so that a trauma is relived. Memory becomes more real than now, with the power to steal the life of the present. But sometimes normally I live in memory and day dreams.

The opposite problem of forgetting is even more devastating, from the amnesia of brain injury to the soul stealing plague of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease. This disease takes away the ability to make new memories, and further, the brain tissue in which our memories are stored is progressively destroyed. We forget our self, our family, the meaning of …everything. I think it’s safe to say, we simply are our memories.

Finally, memory is wrapped up in time itself! Perhaps moments are eternal, as Einstein suggests: there simply is a fabric of space-time. But since we can no longer experience these moments, their only proof is in our memory, and they way those moments continue to impact us today. “Teach us to number our days” says the psalmist, to grow wise in heart. Perhaps archiving our days deepens their meaning, and our connections.

“What’s love got to do with it?” Sang Tina Turner
“What’s love but a second hand emotion?..
What’s love but a sweet old fashioned notion”
There’s a new club on campus, just a handful of kids, who are dissatisfied with their learning bundled into neat little courses, and seek the wisdom of looking at the spaces between the disciplines. The kid who started the club was my student last term, one of those brilliant, curious, inspiring young people it’s just an honor to meet! Anyway the topic he wants to explore is a classic: “Love”. Originally for Valentine’s Day week, it’s been postponed to now, early April because their life “stuff” got in the way of the planned schedule. But now it’s spring, a time we traditionally read from Song of Songs, and it seems just perfect timing.
I’m one of the two presenters, and I am hoping that because of the interdisciplinary theme, they won’t mind if I merge the science with music and a children’s book!
Back to Tina Turner:
Love’s definitely a first hand emotion, strongly controlled by several hormones, for the various types of loveOxytocin: released by the pituitary commands a new mom to fall helplessly in love with her newborn, and facilitates breast feeding.
Sex hormones for eros, of course.Dopamine for the type of love which is addictive, that spurs uncontrollable desire.
Definitely a first hand emotion.
As for the “sweet old fashioned notion” which praises lust and belittles love in Tina’s song, consider this: Many animals, Tigers, for example, mate and separate, leading a solitary lives, but lone humans and our infants are helpless. Humans are very social, and our young require an enormous time commitment compared to other mammals, the kind that requires love and altruism for family and group survival.

In a song called “Love will show the way” Dave Wilcox presents a fabulous argument that love is far more than a sweet old fashioned notion.

You say you see no hope, you say you see no reason to believe
that the world could ever change, you say that love is foolish to believe in, ’cause there’ll always be some crazy, with an army or a knife, to take away your daydream, put the fear back in your life…” Then David riffs off of Macbeth: all the world’s a stage…
“It is love that mixed the mortar and it’s love that stacked these stones, and it’s love that built the stage here, though it looks like we’re alone. In this scene set all in shadows, like the night is here to stay, there is evil cast around us, but it’s love that wrote the play, and in this darkness love will show the way”

And David’s right – love has built us. It may seem inadequate at times, but it did get us here!
And love is one of those things that exists in the space between, more than the sum of its parts, right up the alley of this club. In a sweet children’s story, the Velveteen rabbit, the love of a child turns a beloved stuffed bunny real. The bunny becomes shabby from use, and is finally consumed in flame because it’s a mass of scarlet fever germs. It only then becomes real. Life consumes us too. Perhaps love’s the more powerful reality which transcends our “flash in the pan” lives. Though insubstantial, it can make our lives real with meaning.
Finally, the musical “Rent” is playing on campus this week. In Rent’s most famous song, Seasons of Love “how do measure a year in the life? In daylights, in sunsets, in midnights, in cups of coffee, in inches, in miles in laughter in strife, in, 525,600 minutes, how do you measure a year in the life? How about love?” Suggests Larson. A good question!

Papa, Can You Hear Me? , sang Barbara Streisand in the movie Yentl, after her father dies. I remember everything you taught me, every book I ever read,…Papa how I love you,… miss you, she sings. And so her father is very much with her, in spirit and influence, though he is gone. Her Papa’s willingness to educate his daughter, imparting learning, and the love of learning changes everything for Yentl. And so it is with, not only our fathers, but those teachers who have changed our lives. Which brings us to this week’s Torah portion, Vayechi, which means “and he lived”, but is really about the end of Jacob’s life and his death.
It is also the end of an era, the end of Genesis. Never again will there be Patriarchs. The foundation of the nation of Israel has been set in human flesh and family and will become the stuff of legend. The twelve tribes are set in the heavens as the twelve signs of the zodiac. I visited the Synagogue near Beit She-an and saw the mosaics of the twelve tribes – each with its symbol: Judah is the lion, perhaps Leo. This astrology is controversial, but primal, symbolic images will prevail as papa Jacob/Israel blesses his sons.
But Jacob’s death is also personal, it is our papa Jacob who dies: we are his children, the children of Israel
And his grandchildren – for the first time Grandparent/grandchild interaction happens in Torah, in this incredibly moving encounter between Jacob with Joseph’s sons Ephraim and Menasseh.
This final part of the saga begins as Jacob, who has come to Egypt and met with Pharoah, and lived her 17 years, is sick. This is first mention of illness ever. According to Talmud, (Baba Metzia 87a) Jacob actually prays that illness should come before death. Joseph is told “your father is ill, you need to go to him. And so Joseph goes and brings his boys . They are announced, and Jacob pulls his strength together, sits up on the bed, and begins to speak of the old times. God appeared to me in Luz, in Canaan and blessed me saying I would become a Kahal of people and that this land would belong to my descendants. As for me, I miss my Rachel, your mamma, I loved her so, but she died on me. Ah, who are these children?
“They are my sons, my Abba, whom God has given me:” And Jacob’s eyes are heavy with age, and he cannot see.. I never even prayed to see your face again, and now God has let me see not just you, but your children also.
Did you notice something mysterious here? How can Jacob see them, “he cannot see”! Obviously with Grandpa-eyes.

And Joseph released his sons and bowed to the ground. And Grandpa Jacob Sent out (Yishlach) his hand to the boys to change family history
This “sending out” to touch is going to connect these two generations in a powerful way. Once before a Father “Yishlach” sent out, his hand, but that was Abraham on the verge of slaughtering his son.
Now a grandfather is sending out his hand to bless and he’s going to cross his hands on purpose (sikel et yadav – with wisdom in his hands) to bless the younger with the favored right hand over the left. Joseph thinks it’s a mistake, and tries to correct his Dad: “I know, my son, I know” Jacob repeats. And in one motion reverses a mistake of three generations. Always the younger battled and fought to gather blessings that belonged to the elder. But these boys will not fight. They will be blessed only because they are treasured Grandsons. It’s Ok Joseph, the older will be great too, but this younger one will be better. And always will my name live in Israel, and that of my fathers, Abe and Isaac, and they will bless their sons saying May you be like Ephraim and Menasseh. And we do, Always bless the children!
In a way the crossing of the hands is a distraction to the real truth, which is: we always bless our children, all of them, not just the elder, so they know, we love them because they are our beautiful children.
Oh, by the way, do they have to look beautiful physically? (See Grandpa eyes above)
Jacob has taught his children and grandchildren – in his actions, in an action that carries down in tradition today. Jacob will continue to give advice to all his sons as the portion continue. Perhaps he also blessed Dina, but his daughter’s blessing is lost to history. And Jacob asks to be buried in Canaan, as will Joseph, (and no others). The funeral takes weeks to march the body down. I imagine the sons looking up at the desert night air, looking for their papa’s star, as Yentl does.I touch the future, I teach, the immortal Krista MacCauliff wrote,
Whether we have biological children or not, the ripples of our teaching reach into future lives and ensures that a part of us can not die. Yakov, is every Grandpa and teacher, but also fixer of mistakes of the past generations, sending out a hand to the next generation to heal.
As I look at the night sky, I remember always my beautiful grandparents, my father, and those others who’ve taught me so much. “The stars that light up the darkest nights, are the lights that guide us, “ wrote Channah senesh. (Yeish Kochavim)

It is customary upon completing a book of the Torah to chant Chazak, “be strong, be strong, and strengthen one another” In Dan Nichol’s Chazak, another connection: Torah strengthens by teaching us just as Papa Jacob and Yentl’s papa strengthen by teaching.Rafael Ramos died last week, father of two boys – who look just like their Dad. I dedicate this effort to them. Rafael was studying for the chaplaincy in the NYPD, and his name means “God heals”, and may God indeed heal the boys’ hearts. May all our fathers’ and teachers’ memories be for blessing. CHAZAK